CCISS Conference Program

CCISS runs an active conference program designed to promote the advancement of knowledge and public discussion of topical issues in Intelligence and National Security affairs. The CCISS conference program includes a series of specialized conferences on Intelligence Analysis, national conferences, symposia and workshops on topics of Canadian interest and concern, and international conferences on leading-edge policy research.

The launching of the new Centre was marked by a national conference on Canada’s Foreign Intelligence Requirements: Threats, Capabilities and Options in June, 2002. Panels of distinguished speakers from Canada, Great Britain and the United States addressed panels on Canadian Involvement in Foreign Intelligence: History, Policy Values; Threat Assessments and Requirements; and Strategic Roles and Expectations. The Keynote address was delivered by Arthur Kroeger, Chancellor of Carleton University, on “Intelligence in Canadian Public Policy.”

In 2003 CCISS launched a series of specialized conferences on Intelligence Analysis designed to meet the professional development needs of the Canadian S&I analytical community. These conferences brought together distinguished speakers from the Canadian and international intelligence communities, academe and private sector to address current approaches and methodologies pertaining to intelligence analysis and assessment. Though intended for the Canadian community of intelligence analysis and managers of analysts, a small number of places at these conferences were made available, upon request, to trainers and researchers from other countries. The first of these specialized conferences on Intelligence Assessment: Recent Trends, Canadian Requirements was convened in March 2003. The second, the Conference on Intelligence Analysis – 2: Evolving Tasks, Emergent Capabilities took place in November, 2003. A third conference on Intelligence Analysis-3: Anticipating Strategic Surprise and Early Warning” was mounted in June, 2004.

Major international conferences organized CCISS included an international conference co-sponsored with CSDS and the Department of War Studies at the Royal Military College of Canada on “Peacekeeping Intelligence: New Players, Extended Borders” in December, 2003; a conference on “The Gouzenko Affair: The Beginnings of Canadian Counter-Espionage and Cold War Intelligence History” in April, 2004, co-sponsored with the Canadian War Museum, the Carleton Centre for Research on Canadian Russian Relations, and Library and Archives Canada; a international symposium on Making National Security Accountable: International Perspectives on Intelligence Review and Oversight, which took place in May, 2005, supported by the Security Intelligence Review Committee; and an international conference on Critical Energy Infrastructure Protection Policy: Assessing Threats, Vulnerabilities and Responses that was convened in March, 2006. An international conference on “The Administration of Justice and National Security in Democracies” is being planned for June 2007, in cooperation with the Federal Court.

CCISS has also partnered with other institutions in mounting national and international scholarly conferences. The Centre was a co-sponsor with the Canadian Institute for the Administration of Justice of a national conference on “Terrorism, the Law and Democracy” in Montreal in March, 2002; with Canadian Association for Security and Intelligence Studies in co-hosting the CASIS 2003 Conference on “The New International Intelligence Order: Knowledge for Security and International Relations” in Ottawa in September 2002); and with the Conference Board of Canada in the May, 2005, “ First Public-Private Sector Summit on National Security.”

CCISS joined with the CyberSecurity and Emergency Preparedness Institute of the University of Texas at Dallas in mounting a specialized Research Workshop on North American Energy Infrastructure Protection and Policies in Dallas, Texas, in January 2006, under the auspices of the CEIP Policy Project.